Enugu PDP Guber Candidate Sues APC Chair for N1bn
Gideon Arinze in Enugu
Governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Enugu State, Peter Mbah, has instituted a libel suit against the Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state, Ugochukwu Agballah and the Independent Newspapers Limited, publishers of Daily Independent Newspapers.
According to his lawyers, statement and publication by the defendants were “calculated to lower the Claimant (Mbah) in the estimation of right thinking members of the society; isolate the claimant from the society; expose the Claimant to hatred, odium, contempt, and ridicule; cause other persons to shun or avoid the Claimant; and discredit the Claimant in the matter of his business and political engagements.”
Mbah is therefore, demanding the sum of N1billion as general damages for the said libelous publication.
In the lawsuit marked E/25/2023 filed before the Enugu State High Court, the entrepreneur accused Agballah and the Independent Newspapers of false and malicious publication about his person in the 30th May 2022 online edition of the newspaper.
In a Statement of claim filed by his lawyers, Onyechi Ikpeazu SAN & Co, Mbah said that Agballah accused him of joining the governorship race in order to use Enugu’s funds to pay up an alleged N40 billion business debt.
He equally accused Agballah of labeling him a member of a criminal gang, which allegedly engaged in malicious damage to property, assault, and other criminal activities against the people of Enugu State.
Mbah said that he was severely embarrassed by countless calls and messages from concerned family members, business and political associates, loved ones, friends and in-laws, while several Nigerians, who thought the claims to be true, condemned him in the media and social media platforms.
He added that although he had caused his solicitors to write the defendants vide a correspondence dated 22nd July, 2022 in which he demanded a retraction of the publication and an apology as well as compensation for damaging his reputation, they chose to ignore it.
“The Defendants have not brought the publication down and accordingly will continue to defame and maliciously damage the Claimant’s reputation, unless restrained by the Court,” he said.
Mbah is therefore seeking the sum of N1 billion as general damages, an order mandating the defendants to publish an apology to him in at least three national dailies in Nigeria, and a clear retraction of the defamatory publication made against him. He is equally demanding N10 million as cost of the suit.
